Catchup

I read the other day that 99% of blog posts are about why the author hasn't posted lately so let's don't even go there. I wanted to post, I meant to post; things kept coming up and time slipped away from me - again. So here's my picture of Fall in the country I meant to write about.

What I'm supposed to be doing right now is writing a short biography for promotional material. An artist's biography is really more like a resume in paragraph form. Since I don't have an art degree and haven't won any serious awards I don't have a lot to say. I have won a couple of merit awards, can I call myself an award winning artist or is that stretching it? You try writing something complimentary about yourself when you know people you know are going to read it and know that you wrote it. I need to send it in tomorrow. I feel like I'm in high school and have waited until the last minute to start my essay.

JD just finished the last of several pieces he was building that had to be finished by Christmas so he's feeling de-stressed. Do you know why people have furniture custom made? Because they can't find pieces big enough for their house. All of the pieces he did for this client were over nine feet tall. I have to get some pictures of his work to show you because he does amazing work. The only picture I could find was of this piece we did about 6 years ago. I say we because I did the finishing. The doors are antique French; the piece was built around them and finished to match.
There was an elaborate base and crown and they (there were TWO of them) were the biggest armoires I had ever seen. They were gorgeous but so big that I would burst out laughing when I looked at them. Now, for several years now, everything he builds is this big. Or bigger.

Before I became an artist full time I painted furniture and sold antiques. I was a master of the distressed finish if I do say so myself. Wonder if I can work that into my biography? I need filler.

Lady Bug Lady Bug Fly Away Home

Or is it Lady Bird, Lady Bird ? Anyway every year at this time we are inundated with Lady Bugs in the house. Yes the curtain is on a shower rod. It's a long story. As I was saying, we have hundreds and hundreds of lady bugs in the house. I should say on the the windows, the ones on the sunny side of the house. How or why they get in I don't know. I mean I can see a few slipping in under the door but you'd think we'd notice if there were hoards of them lining up like ants. They'll crawl around in the window a couple of days then drop lifeless to the windowsill and floor. I used to sweep them up and put them in the trash then my daughter told me that they're hibernating. I didn't believe it but next time I put them in a box and saved them and sure enough next Spring when it started getting warm they started moving. Is that not cool? Unless you think having a box of bugs in your house is creepy.

I'm Back.....Again

I made a point of saying in my last post that I was going to post more often, then I took off to visit my daughter in North Carolina and I just got back so here I am, late again. As I said in an earlier post, she lives in the Smoky Mountains, so close to the park boundary you can see it from her house. So of course when she has a day off what do we do? Go shopping in Asheville of course. This time it was really fun as it turns out Dilliard's (a big department store in the south) has a regional clearance center here. And it's enormous and crammed full of clothes, good clothes not just the dregs no one wanted. Everything is 70% off with specials that change every Wednesday so that some things are an additional 40% off! They owe you money! She bought a beautiful satin evening dress with beading (for a Halloween costume) for $12. I thought you would like to know.

Speaking of Halloween, I have a ghost story to tell. It's not often you get a new audience to tell one of your old stories to, so here it is.

It happened about 30 years ago. My first husband and I were living in Knoxville in a new house in a new subdivision so I can't explain why this happened there, but it did. One night I awoke suddenly out of a deep sleep with the feeling someone was in the room. I sat up in bed. It was a very dark night but I could see a small figure at the foot of the bed. It was wearing a long white gown. At first I thought it was my six year old daugher and I called her name several times. Then the figure slowly disappeared, dissolved before my eyes. My heart was pounding and I couldn't go back to sleep but I didn't talk about it the next day because I didn't want to scare the children.

It wasn't until six years later that my daughter, then 12, overheard me telling someone about what I saw. She said, "I can't believe you never told me about that! One night when I was about six I saw a man and a woman in a red dress dancing down the hall! I thought it was you and dad at first......I didn't say anything because I didn't think anyone would believe me!"

I was stunned. And I so regret that I didn't do more research to find out what the story was about where the house was built. Was it on the site of an old farmhouse? Perhaps even a family cemetary? All I can say is that I was young and had three small children and didn't know how to research things back then. And we were transfered not long after. So I guess it will always be a mystery. I think about contacting the people who live there now and asking them if they've ever seen anything but I guess I'm afraid they would think I'm nuts. I had my chance to find out something about the other side and I missed it.

What would you have done?

I'm Back!

I finished my last art festival this weekend. It was Kentuck down in Northport, Alabama, one of the top festivals in the Southeast. It’s such a fun show to do. The focus is on Outsider art so there’s lots of far out stuff to see but the best thing is that the whole atmosphere is so festive and everyone seems so happy. The October weather was perfect, bright and sunny, but cool, a perfect weekend to be out in the park. The entertainment was above average to outstanding, like blues singer Ruthie Foster who had the crowd on their feet dancing and afterwards they rushed in and bought all her Cds in about five minutes.
At least that’s what I heard as I am stuck in my booth all day except for five minute bathroom breaks and never get to see anything except the view above. Not that I’m complaining because sales were good despite the fact that the economy is apparently going down the toilet.

Don’t you love this car? Doesn’t it make you want to go glue random stuff all over yours? What’s really amazing is this is apparently a 20 year old Vega or Pinto or something like that, that still runs.


We cheaped out this year and camped at a state park six miles away instead of paying a bazillion dollars for a cummy motel room because it’s game weekend. (This is Tuscaloosa area – home of the University of Alabama. You may know football is a big deal around here.) Lake Lurleen is beautiful, one of the best maintained parks I’ve seen anywhere. We took our bikes and did a little riding.


This is JD getting some shots of some horses in the beautiful foggy twilight on a road near the park. Afterwards we spent 30 minutes in the dark looking for his glasses because he has a habit of sticking them in the neck of his shirt and they fall out. I can’t believe we found them.

I always feel a little blue after a fun and exciting show is over but I’m coming out of it now and will be posting more regularly so don’t give up on me.

The Dark Side

We met a new neighbor the other day, who was moving back to the family land after being away a long time. He grew up here, across the road. His father owned the cotton gin that used to stand on the corner. He was telling us about how much things have changed since he moved away many years ago. Then he told us about something that happened when he was a child.

It was in the 1960's and he was five years old. There was a man who lived in "the cove" who still rode his mule to town. He always tied it up at the cotton gin then walked to the store across the tracks. Randy and his brother were playing in the yard when the man came one day, tied up his mule and walked to the store. He appeared to be covered in red paint. They told their father who was waiting for him when he came back. It wasn't paint, it was blood. He had just killed his neighbor with an axe.


Speaking of killer, here's a killer version of The Thrill is Gone. B.B. King with Eric Clapton and Phil Collins on drums. You can turn my music off if you scroll down to the player. Or go to youtube and watch.

Fall at Last

“All things on earth point home in old October; sailors to sea, travellers to walls and fences, hunters to field and hollow and the long voice of the hounds, the lover to the love he has forsaken” - Thomas Wolfe



This isn't a very October looking picture but long shadows in the afternoon is the only indication that the season is changing around here. I find it hard to write anything without some kind of visual aid and this is the best I could do. It's my street, past our house.

It's so wonderful that Fall is finally here. We so look forward the end of the long hot days of Summer and the sharp clear light of autumn.

We've been super busy around here turning over a new leaf. What does that mean anyhow? Do the leaves just keep turning over? Anyway we're trying to stick to more of a schedule, get more work done, exercise more, eat less, lose weight, yadda yadda yadda.

Nothing is going on around here except work work work. Just wanted to check in and say I'm still here.

Stalking the Elusive Felis Domesticas

I was going to title this BFF but I couldn't get a picture of Buz and Todd together-they're so cute when they curl up together and lick each other's neck- but Buz is afraid of the camera and runs whenever I get it out while Todd won't keep his face out of the lens. I guess you can tell they're brothers. Does anyone recognize who they're named after? Route 66? Buz and Todd hit the road in a red corvette? My favorite TV show when I was twelve. I'm not sure how you knew it was a red corvette since the show was in black and white, but you knew. It was the definition of cool in 1963.

Buz (the one on the sidewalk - I had to shoot his picture from 30 feet away)is the sweet one and he loves JD. I mean loves him. He always comes running to meet him when he comes home. And I'm the one that feeds them. So the other day JD was waving something around for Todd to chase and he did that thing cats do - play play play then ball up on your hand and bite hard enough to draw blood, and Buz was watching and ran over and knocked the crap out of Todd for biting. Attack cat.

Fly Away

This picture has nothing to do with this post; I just needed to put something here. JD wasn't home last night so I had a bowl of cereal for dinner and spent the night blogging to my heart's content. Not here obviously. You think this is the only place I have? I've got three other blogs to keep up. Actually four now. Only two are open right now because I'm not far along enough to share the others.

This newest one - well, we leapt (yes, leapt is right, I looked it up) into the 21st century by joining Netflix a couple of months ago. Already we can't remember what we've seen. We were,like, what was that movie we saw last week? The one we liked so much? The one we gave five stars? (It was Amelie. If you haven't seen it go rent it right now. I'll wait. Be sure to watch it in French.) So we got this bright idea to start a blog of reviews of movies we've seen. Mostly for us, so we can remember what we've seen. So JD made this neat header and we've uploaded five pictures from movies. But we've only written one review because designing blogs and picking out pictures is a lot more fun than actually writing something. And music - movie blog must have movie themes playing. So I spent an absurd amount of time looking for movie themes last night. It was wonderful. I heart my computer.

You've probably noticed I have music on this blog. I tried to pick out music that wouldn't be annoying. I love it. I often leave it playing in the background. Listen, playlist is so much fun. You don't have to put it on anything, you can just create an account and listen to it there. You can have more than one list. You can have up to 95 songs on each list. You can find anything there. It's FREE. It's not illegal because you're not downloading anything. Have you looked at my music? Acker Bilk? Who else remembers Acker Bilk? Anyone? Or am I the oldest living person in the blogosphere?

I thought so.

I've Been Busy

As usual I've waited 'till the last minute so I am working as fast as I can to get ready for shows this fall. I've been matting and framing up a storm. Can you tell? I am knee deep in mat board right now. And now I can't find anything.

Friday and Saturday we both had a show downtown so that's one out of the way. You wouldn't believe what we have to load up to do a show, especially since there's two of us. I mean there's all these heavy display screens that have to be put together when you get there,and folding tables, and boxes and boxes of prints and paintings. When it's outside there's two tents. JD always says he feels like a carny worker; all that's missing is the tilt-a-whirl.

This show was downtown in what they call the loft district because anything that doesn't move has been turned into a loft. I love it. I would so live here if I could afford it. Preferably next to a grocery store. It's been my dream for years to live on the same block as a grocery store. What is wrong with me that I need to go to the grocery store every single day? And the grocery store that used to be two miles away burned down last week so now it's a six mile trip to the nearest store where they do not have anything whole wheat, or decent lettuce. Ever. I think they get it in pre-wilted.

I'm in a bad mood and ranting about the lettuce because I have to drive 20 miles tomorrow to the nearest real grocery store, by which I mean Walmart,and who goes to Walmart and doesn't spend 3 hours so that's most of my day, which means I get nothing done in the studio but hey, we have to eat. Wheat bread and lettuce mostly.

Time Marches On. And On.

I had a birthday last week but I'm OK now.

Until last Wednesday I hadn't been bothered by a birthday since the year I turned 35. Thirty-Five. I realized I was halfway through my thirties and I cried and cried. I'm from the generation that coined the phrase "Never trust anyone over thirty." Probably most of you don't even remember that but it seemed very profound at the time.

After that I got ok with getting older. You're only as old as you feel, 50 is the new 40, 60 is the new 50, blah blah blah. But this birthday was a milestone and it felt weird. I think of myself as middle aged and I'm not, not any more. I have grandchildren. And two great grandchildren.This picture was taken two years ago. Five generations. We didn't line up right as I should be next to my mother but I'm in the middle. In twenty years I'll be at the end of the line.

That's a scary.